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Published in IET Generation, Transmission & Distribution
Received on 13th December 2010
Revised on 15th September 2011
doi: 10.1049/iet-gtd.2010.0812

ISSN 1751-8687

Two-stage method for optimal island partition of

distribution system with distributed generations
L. Jikeng1 W. Xudong2 W. Peng1 L. Shengwen1 S. Guang-hui3 M. Xin3
X. Xing-wei3 L. Shanshan4
1
Key laboratory of Power System Simulation and Control of Ministry of Education of School of Electrical Power and
Automation, Tianjin University, Tianjin 300072, People Republic of China
2
Tianjin Power Technical Center, Tianjin 300384, People Republic of China
3
The Northeast Electric Power dispatching Center of People’s Republic of China, Shenyang 110001, People’s Republic of China
4
Schneider Electric (China) Investment Co., Ltd, Shanghai 201114, People Republic of China
E-mail: mejklin@126.com, xudongwang@tju.edu.cn

Abstract: In this study, a novel island partition model of distribution system with distributed generations (DGs) is presented and a
two-stage method based on branch and bound algorithm is designed to solve this model. In the first stage, an initial island partition
scheme is acquired through an island isolating process composed of a serial of tree knapsack problems (TKPs) and island
combination process; in the second stage, an optimal island partition scheme is obtained after the feasibility checking and
adjustment of the initial scheme to mitigate the constraint violations. Each TKP is solved by branch and bound algorithm
with three improved measures. The proposed model meets the requirements of practical engineering application because it
takes account of key factors as the load priorities, load controllability, power balance, voltage and equipment transmission
capability. Moreover, the computational complexity of the method is relatively low, which makes it be acceptable for
engineering application. The proposed method is verified with a 69-bus test system with six integrated DGs. Comparison with
other methods demonstrates that the new model and method is feasible and valid.

Nomenclature D v′ sum of all nodes demands of the  sub-tree

T ′ (v) rooted at v, and is equal to i[T ′ (v)di
Symbols and abbreviations
D̄vS intermediate variable which is equal to DvS
a controllable ratio of load PL at node L when vS is obtained
av father node of node v D̄0 intermediate variable which is equal to D0
when vS is obtained
b uncontrollable ratio of load PL at node L
g[G set of distributed generation (DG) nodes in
cv weight of node v, for a load node,
the tree model of the distribution system
cv ¼ Wvdv; for a generator node, cv ¼ 0
with DG
Cv sum of all nodes weighs of  a sub-tree T(v)
H average output power of DG at root node 0
rooted at v, and is equal to i[T (v)ci
h iteration index during critical item
C v′ sum of all nodes weighs of the sub-tree
 calculation
T ′ (v) rooted at v, and is equal to i[T (v)ci
i[V¼ node set of tree, 0 is root node number
C̄vS intermediate variable which is equal to the
{0, 1, 2, . . . , n}
CvS when vS is obtained
kn branching node number
C̄0 intermediate variable which is equal to the
C0 when vS is obtained k total number of isolated islands in an island
partition scheme
dS weight summation of the compressed nodes
l[v, g] node set of the unique path from node v to
dv demand of node v; for a load node, dv is the
node g
real power load of node v; for a generator
node, dv is the generation power input at M container of storing branching nodes
node v, and is a negative value n maximum number of all nodes in a tree
Dv sum of all nodes demands of a sub-tree T (v) N total number of nodes in a tree, and is equal
rooted at v, and is equal to i[T (v)di to n + 1

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Piloss network loss of the ith isolated island An optimal island partition scheme should take into
Pl[av,v] power flow through branch P [av , v] account the following factors and constraints [6]:
Pl[avmax
, v] power flow limit through branch P [av , v]
1. the restrictions of power balance, voltage and equipment
PL active power of load at node L transmission capability;
PS total output of the DGs directly connecting 2. maximum load restoration (principal load and even total
to node L load);
rv value density of sub-tree rooted at node v in 3. the influence of the controllable/uncontrollable load on
tree T, and is equal to Cv/Dv island partition.
r v′ value density of sub-tree rooted at node v in DG islanding operation is an important operation mode in
tree T ′, and is equal to Cv′ / Dv′ future smart grid. Many excellent research results have been
r̄vS intermediate variable, and is equal to rvS presented on islanding operation and island partition. In
when vS is obtained [7], the feasibility and system configuration of adaptive
Si ith isolated island in an island partition scheme intentional islanding operation is demonstrated and
s last element of M provided. In [8], by the strategy of extended sequential
sampling, an approach to determine the islanding operation
T ¼ (V, E) undirected tree T with edge set E and vertex mode or synchronising operation mode of the system is
set V introduced. However, the optimal island network partition is
T(v) sub-tree rooted at node v in tree T, and can not discussed in both [7, 8]. By searching the power circle
be obtained by removing branch (av , v) with DG in the centre, an island partition scheme to realise
T ′ (V′, E′ ) current tree T ′ with edge set E ′ and vertex the maximum equivalent restored load is presented in
set V ′ [9, 10], but in case of multiple DGs existence in the system,
it might be difficult to achieve the optimal scheme because
T ′ (2vi) sub-tree rooted at 2vi in tree T’, 2vi is
of the potential overlaps of different power circles. In [11],
positive integer
DG island separation method based on rooted tree
T ′ (2vs) sub-tree of T ′ rooted at vS model with fault point being the root node is suggested.
TKP relaxation problem of tree knapsack However, same as [9, 10], it only takes into account the
problem uncontrollable load but not the controllable part in
Uv voltage value of node v their models. A heuristic graph-based island partition
algorithm is presented in [6]; limited to that only one
Umax
v maximal voltage value of node v island could be constructed by the method, the unrestored
Umin
v minimal voltage value of node v service area may be large when the DGs are far away from
UNv rated voltage value of node v each other.
UT upper bound of TKP In this study, the optimal island partition scheme is
modelled as a constrained non-linear integer programming
vS critical item problem; then, a two-stage approach of ‘searching +
2vS non-critical item; and minus symbol ‘2’ is feasibility checking and adjusting’ is designed to solve this
directly added to the related node number to problem. Results on a test system indicate that the proposed
mark that node vS is not critical item model and method are feasible and valid.
Wv unit load weight of node v
xv [ X ¼ state variable of node v, if node v is included 2 Model of optimal island partition of
{xi|i ¼ 1, in the optimal island scheme, xv ¼ 1; distribution system with DGs
2, . . . , n} otherwise, xv ¼ 0
2.1 Rooted tree model of distribution system
XS incumbent solution of TKP with DGs
X̄S optimal feasible solution found by branch
and bound algorithm When distribution system experiences an outage, the loads
z objective function value corresponding to located in the downstream area of the fault section will lose
incumbent solution XS power supply after the fault is successfully isolated. A
rooted tree model is constructed in this study to represent
z̄ optimal objective function value the topological configuration relationship of the DGs and
corresponding to optimal feasible solution X̄S loads in the considering area. The rooted tree forming
l Lagrangian multiplier procedures are listed as follows:
Ø null set
1. If there is no controllable switch (such as circuit breaker or
isolating switch) on a branch, the branch is reduced and a new
1 Introduction node is produced by merging the two nodes of the branch, and
its load is the sum of loads on the two nodes of the branch.
When a distribution system with integrated distributed Through this process, each branch in the resulted
generations (DGs) experiences an outage, the islanding distribution system has a controllable switch.
operation of DGs may quickly restore the power supply of 2. For any node L, a + b ¼ 1; if a . 0, a child node with
the critical load, reduce the outage time and thus improve load a × PL is created to node L, and the remaining load
the supply reliability [1 – 5]. Therefore study about the b × PL. stays with node L.
proper (or optimal) island partition of distribution system 3. Assume that power exiting from node is positive. For the
has been a hot topic recently. downstream area of the fault section, a tree rooted at the

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simplified as


n
max cv xv
v=1


n
s.t. dv xv ≤ H
v=1 (8)
x0 = 1
xv [ {0, 1}, v = 1, 2, . . . , n
xav ≥ xv , v = 1, 2, . . . , n

Fig. 1 Building of a rooted tree for a simple distribution network

a Original network
b Rooted tree model formed
DG node with the maximal power output could be formed.
There are two parameters dv and cv for each node in the tree.
4. After the rooted tree is formed, the nodes without load
(called connection nodes) will be reduced by merging with
their father nodes.
A rooted tree building process for a simple distribution
system with DGs is illustrated in Fig. 1. In Fig. 1a, two
DGs – DG1 and DG2, are installed at nodes 2 and 5,
respectively; B1 – B3 are circuit breakers; S1 – S3 are
isolating switches; the branch between nodes 2 and 6 has
no switch; load at node 5 is controllable load. By the
above-described procedures, a rooted tree is built and
displayed at Fig. 1b.
2.2 Optimal island partition model of distribution
system with DGs
For a rooted tree formed by the above method, the island
partition issue could be formulated as a constrained non-
linear integer programming problem, which can be
described as follows
The last constraint in (8) is a connectivity constraint,
which means that if node v is selected into the optimal
island scheme, all the nodes on l[0, v] should also be
selected.
The linear integer programming as (8) is a tree knapsack
problem (TKP) [12], which is a non-deterministic
polynomial (NP)-complete problem [13]. It is clear that the
problem as (1) – (7) is much more complex than the
problem as (8); therefore it is at least a NP-hard problem
that cannot be solved within polynomial time. The best
choice might be to find an approximate algorithm to solve
the problem as (1) – (7).
In this study, a two-stage approach-searching + feasibility
checking and adjusting is proposed to solve the problem: in
the first stage, with no consideration of network loss and
the constraints of voltage and equipment transmission
capacity, an initial island partition scheme subject to power
balance (without network loss) constraint is built through
the island isolating procedures composed of a serial of
TKPs and island combinations; in the second stage, power
flow calculation is carried out to check the feasibility of the
initial island scheme and some measures are taken to
mitigate the violations.
Owing to the solving of TKP being a key step for solving
the island partition problem as described in (1) – (7), an
efficient branch and bound algorithm with three improved
measures is adopted to solve TKP.


n
3 Branch and bound algorithm for TKP
max cv xv (1)
v=0 Given an undirectional tree T ¼ (V, E) rooted at 0 [ V, TKP
is a generalised 0– 1 knapsack problem (KP) where all the
subject to the following constraints items (referring to nodes for the problem considering in this
study) are subject to a partial ordering represented by a
xv [ {0, 1} (2) rooted tree. If a node is packed into the knapsack, all the
nodes on the path from this node to the root must also be
xv = 1, v[G (3) packed. Without loss of generality, all nodes are numbered
by depth first search order in the branch and algorithm
xi ≥ xv , i [ l[v, g], ∀v [ V \G, ∃g [ G (4) presented as follows.
 
dv + Ploss
i
≤ |dv |, i = 1, 2, . . . , k (5) 3.1 Critical Item for TKP
v[Si /(Si <G) v[Si <G
The critical item plays a central role in determining a bound of
Uvmin ≤ Uv ≤ Uvmax , v [ Si , i = 1, 2, . . . , k (6) the KP by branch and bound algorithm. For the KP, all items
can be sorted in decreasing order by the profit of per unit
demand in O(N logN ) time and the critical item can be
Pl[av ,v] ≤ Pl[a
max
, v [ Si , i = 1, 2, . . . , k (7)
,v]
v found by consecutively inserting sorted items into the
knapsack until one item exceeds the knapsack capacity [14].
In case that there is only one DG in the downstream of the In this study, the critical item for TKP is achieved by
fault location in the system, for convenience, both the consecutively deleting the sub-tree whose root has the
constraints specified in (6) and (7) and the influence of smallest ratio until the total demand of the remaining tree is
network loss can be ignored temporally, (1) – (7) could be no greater than the capacity H. The definition of the critical

220 IET Gener. Transm. Distrib., 2012, Vol. 6, Iss. 3, pp. 218 –225
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item for TKP and its searching procedure are described as
follows:
1. h ¼ 0.
2. If h ¼ 0, for each node v in T, calculate Cv , Dv and rv;
otherwise, for all v [ l[vS , 0]/{vS} in T, calculate Cv , Dv
and rv . Go to step 3.
3. Let rvS ¼ min{rv | v [ T}. If D0 − DvS ≤ H, a feasible
solution of TKP could be obtained by setting: (I) xv ¼ 0, v
[ T (vS); (P) xv ¼ 1, v [ T/T (vS); vS is the critical item for
TKP; variables C0 , D0 , CvS , DvS and rvS and in T are
correspondingly replaced by C  0, D v , D
 0, C  v and rv ; go to
S S S
step 4. Otherwise, let T ¼ T/T (vS), h ¼ h + 1, go to step 2.
4. The procedure is over.
As at least one node is deleted in each loop operation, at most
n + 1 loop operations can be repeated by the above procedure;
and the critical item can be found within O(N 2) time.
3.2 Upper bound for TKP
Compared with TKP, TKP is gained by removing the integer
constraint. If the optimal solution of TKP is integer solution,
it is also the optimal solution of TKP; otherwise, the objective
function value of TKP is only the upper bound of TKP’s,
which could be obtained through Lagrangian relaxation as

n kn ¼ kn + 1, go to step 3.
f (l, X) = max (cv − ldv )xv + lH
v=1
s.t. x0 = 1 (9)
xv [ {0, 1}, v = 1, 2, . . . , n
xav ≥ xv , v = 1, 2, . . . , n
It has been proven that f (rvS , X ) in (9) is the upper bound of
TKP’s objective function value, and can be calculated
through (10) [15]
f (rvS , X ) = C
0 − C
 v + rv [H − (D
S S
0 − C
 v )]
S
(10)
For a given l, f (l, X ) is an objective function defined on the
un-capacitated sub-tree of a rooted tree problem, and can be
solved within O(N ) time by a bottom-up process [13]. As
the critical item can be calculated within O(N 2) time, the
computation complexity for the upper bound of TKP is
O(N 2) as well.
3.3 Procedures of branch and bound algorithm
for TKP
The branch and bound algorithm for TKP is composed of two sub-
procedures: forward move and backtracking move. To speed up
the search procedure, three measures are adopted: (i) the upper
bound of the solution is calculated by (10); (ii) the node with
the largest r value is always first selected into feasible solution
based on the idea within greedy algorithm; (iii) the forced stop
searching procedure is carried out when a preset threshold value
is met. The complete process is presented as follows.
1. Initialization of variables: let T ′ ¼ T, z = 0, X S = Ø,
M ¼ Ø, dS ¼ 0, kn ¼ 1.
2. Sort all the nodes of tree T ′ except for the root node by the
value of r to be a list from the greatest to the least, and rename
each node number by its position in the list.
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3. If kn . n, go to step 9, start the backtracking move,
otherwise, go to step 4.
4. If node kn is not in the present tree T ′, kn ¼ kn + 1, go to
step 3, otherwise, go to step 5.
5. Compute the weight summation of all non-compressed
nodes in lkn,0 from node kn to the compressed root 0 in tree
T ′, and denote it as dl . If dl + dS .H, go to step 6,
otherwise, go to step 7.
6. If T ′ /T ′ (kn) is a feasible solution, update Xs and z. If z . z,
then (i) let z = z and X S = X s ; (ii) if the difference between
the total demand of the feasible solution and capacity limit H
is less than threshold 1, the procedure is completed,
otherwise go to step 9, start the backtracking move.
If T ′ /T ′ (kn) is not a feasible solution, then (i)
M ¼ M < {-kn}, T ′ ¼ T ′ /T ′ (kn), update a Cv′ , D′v , rv′ of all
the node v on lkn,0/{kn}, compute TKP’s upper bound UT of
current tree T ′ by (10); (ii) if z ≥ UT, go to step 9;
otherwise kn ¼ kn + 1, go to step 3.
7. M ¼ M < {kn}, compress the nodes on l[kn, 0] to root 0 to
form a super-root, and calculate the total demand of the super-
root, dl; dS ¼ dS + dl, update Xs and z. If z . z, let z = z and
X S = X s . If the difference between the feasible solution
demand d and capacity constraint H is less than threshold 1, the
procedure is completed. If there is only one compressed node,
go to step 9, start the backtracking move, otherwise, go to step 8.
8. The UT of current tree T ′ is calculated by (10). If UT ≤ z,
go to step 9, start the backtracking move, otherwise,
Note: Steps 1 –8 compose the forward move.
9. Backtracking move, which is composed of the following
steps.
If M ¼ Ø, the procedure is completed, and X is the optimal
solution of TKP; otherwise, take out the last element s in M.
If s , 0, go to step , otherwise, go to step .
T ′ ¼ T ′ < T ′ (s), in which, T ′ (s) is deleted in step 6. Update
Cv′ , Dv , rv′ of the node v on ls,0/{2s}; M ¼ M/{s}, go to step .
Decompress the nodes on l[s, 0] compressed during the
forward move; M ¼ M/{s}, dS ¼ dS 2 dl, in which, dl denotes
weight summation of non-compressed nodes on ls,0. Go to step .
If T ′ /T ′ (kn) is a feasible solution, then (i) update Xs and z; if
z . z, update z = z and X S = X s ; (ii) if the difference
between the feasible solution demand d and capacity
constrain H is less than threshold e , the procedure is
completed; otherwise go to step .
If T ′ /T ′ (kn) is not a feasible solution, then (i) M ¼ M < {2s},
T ¼ T ′ /T ′ (s); update Cv′ , D′v , rv′ of the node v on ls,0/{s};
′
compute TKP’s upper bound UT of tree T; (ii) If z ≥ UT in
step go to step ; otherwise, kn ¼ kn + 1, go to step 3.
4 Two-stage method for optimal island
partition
4.1 First stage: the construction of initial island
partition scheme
This stage is composed of two procedures: the island isolating
and the island combination.
1. The island isolating procedure:
By the method described at Section 2.1, a rooted tree is
formed, and its root is at the maximal average output DG
node in the downstream area of the fault location. Demand
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and weight of all the DG nodes are set to be zero except for
the root node. The nodes whose demands are zero are
merged with their father nodes to simplify the tree.
For the tree formed, the branch and bound algorithm
proposed in Section 3.3 is used to solve the TKP to obtain
an island.
The island achieved at step is contracted to be a
new DG node whose output is the surplus power of the
island, i.e. difference of the total output power of DGs
and total load power in the island; the root DG node is
labelled.
If all the DGs in current tree are labelled, island isolating
procedure is over, go to step ,1. of island combination
procedure; otherwise, the nodes removed during the
simplification of the tree are restored, and a new tree rooted
at the DG having the maximal average output among the
unlabelled DGs is built again. The demand and weight of
all the DG nodes are set to zero except for the root, and the
nodes whose demands are zero are merged with their father
nodes; go to step .
2. The island combination procedure
, 1 . If there is a load L directly connecting to multiple
DGs (the artificial DGs formed through the contraction of
islands), it means that the load power PL is greater than
the output power of any single DG connecting to L;
therefore the combination of these islands is performed to
be a larger new island with one of the two conditions
below being true:
(a) Load L is a controllable load;
(b) Load L is an uncontrollable load and PL ≤ PS; go to step
,2. of this procedure; otherwise, go to step ,3 ..
,2. If the surplus power of the new island is greater than
zero, the island is further contracted to be a new DG node,
and go to step of the island isolating procedure;
otherwise, go to step ,1. of this procedure.
,3 . The surplus power of the isolated islands is preferentially
supplied to the loads directly connecting to them with higher
priority. The island combination procedure is over and the
initial island partition scheme is achieved.
4.2 Second stage: feasibility checking and
adjusting of the initial Island partition scheme
For each isolated island, let the maximal output DG be the
slack node and other DGs be PV node, power flow
calculation is performed to check the feasibility of the
initial optimal island partition scheme. If the output power
of the slack node is greater than its average output power
because of the network loss, some unimportant
controllable loads will be shed to ensure power balance. If
some of nodes voltage or equipments capability are
beyond their limits, adjusting measures such as voltage
regulation of DGs, reactive power compensation, load
shedding and so on, will be taken to remove those
violations. Thus, the optimal island partition scheme is
eventually derived.
4.3 Analysis of computation complexity for the
two-stage approach
It could be seen that most of the calculation efforts of the
above island partition algorithm is on solving the serial of
TKPs based on the branch and bound method. The
computational efficiency of the branch and bound method
strongly depends on three key procedures: the procedure of
upper bound estimation, the node-splitting procedure and
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when to stop the searching procedure. For the key
procedures, three measures are correspondingly adopted to
speed up the calculation in the above algorithm:
1. With the help of the critical item for each TKP, upper
bound of the optimal value of TKP could be found within
O(N 2) time.
2. On the basis of the idea of greedy algorithm, the node-
splitting procedure is performed at the node owning the
largest r value among the current tree, because from the
beginning of the above algorithm, the node with the largest
r value always being first selected into the feasible solution.
This speeds up to achieve the solution that its demand is
very close to the DG’s output.
3. Owing to the fact that branch and bound algorithm is
actual just pseudo-enumeration method, to speed up the
ending of the searching procedure, the forced stop searching
measure is adopted: if the objective function of any feasible
solution is equal to the upper bound, or the demand of the
current solution is very close to the DG’s output (smaller
than threshold 1), it means that the optimal solution in the
view of practical engineering is found and the searching
procedure for the optimal solution is immediately stop.
Therefore the calculation efficiency of above island
partition algorithm is significantly improved and will be
acceptable for the practical engineering application.
5 Test results and analysis
The PG&E 69-bus distribution system integrated with six
DGs shown as Fig. 2 is taken to be the test system. The
parameters of the system could be found in [16].
Six DGs are, respectively, installed at the node 5, 19, 32,
36, 52 and 65, and the average real power outputs of those
DGs are, respectively, 50, 400, 40, 250, 1300 and 100 kW.
Priority and type of each load in the system and power
capacity limit of each branch are listed in Tables 1 –3,
respectively. Unit load weights for priority level 1, 2 and 3
are 100, 10 and 1, respectively. For each node v, the
maximal/minimal voltage is set as Uvmax = 1.05,
UvN and Uvmin = 0.95UvN , respectively.
To remove all kinds of constraint violations, the adjusting
rules for load shedding are listed as follows: (a) the load
with lower priority is to be shed first, compared with the
higher priority load; (b) the controllable load is to be shed
first, compared with the uncontrollable load.
Fig. 2 PG&E 69-bus distribution system integrated with six DGs
IET Gener. Transm. Distrib., 2012, Vol. 6, Iss. 3, pp. 218 –225
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Table 1 Load priority

priority 1 6, 9, 12, 18, 35, 37, 42, 51, 57, 62

priority 2 other nodes
priority 3 7, 10, 11, 13, 16, 22, 28, 43, 45 –48, 59– 60, 63

Table 2 Load type

100% controllable load 26 –27, 34, 39–41, 43 –44, 48,

53– 56, 58, 66 –69
40% controllable load 11, 13, 21, 38
uncontrollable other nodes

Fig. 4 Initial optimal island partition scheme of the distribution

Table 3 Branch power flow limit system integrated with DGs

Transmission lines Power limit,

kW
1 –2, 2– 3, 3– 4, 4–5, 5–6, 6 – 7, 7 –8, 8 –9
9 –42, 42– 43, 43–44, 44 –45, 45– 46, 46 –47, 47– 48,
50– 51, 51–52, 48 –49, 49– 50
4 –36, 36– 37, 9– 10, 37–38, 10 –11, 11– 12
38– 39, 12–13, 13 –14, 14– 15, 15 –16, 16 –17, 52– 53
17– 18, 3– 59, 18–19, 19 –20, 20– 21, 59 –60, 60– 61,
61– 62, 62–63, 3–28, 63 –64, 64– 65, 65 –66, 66– 67,
67– 68, 28–29, 21 –22, 53– 54, 22 –23, 23 –24, 12– 57,
8 –40, 29– 30, 30–31, 31 –32, 32– 33, 68 –69, 11– 55,
24– 25, 25–26, 57 –58, 33– 34, 55 –56, 26 –27, 34– 35,
40– 41
After successful isolation of three-phase grounding fault
4200
on the branches 2 – 3, the downstream area of the outage
2000
section loses power supply temporarily; the two-stage
method for optimal island partition as proposed is applied
1000
and its calculation procedures and results are presented as
500
follows:
360
1. Tree T1 rooted at the maximum power source DG4 is
formed. Island S1 composed of DG4 and load nodes 50–52 is
obtained by the branch and bound algorithm. S1 is contracted
to be a new DG node G1 , whose output power is 24 kW.
2. Tree T2 rooted at the current maximum power source
DG3 is formed. Island S2 composed of DG3 and load nodes

Fig. 3 Island isolating procedure

a New DG node-G1 is formed
b New DG node-G2 is formed
c New DG node-G3 is formed
d New DG node-G4 is formed
e New DG node-G5 is formed

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Fig. 5 Island partition scheme formed by the method of [6, 10]
a By the method of ref. [10]
b By the method of ref. [6]
12– 20, 57, 58 is obtained by the branch and bound algorithm.
S2 is contracted to be a new DG node G2 , whose output power
is 16.5 kW.
3. As the loads at nodes 36, 4, 5 are zero, path l[DG1, DG2]
is compressed as new generation GS . Tree T3 rooted at GS is
formed. Then island S3 composed of DG1, DG2 and load
nodes 4 – 9, 36 –37, 40– 44 is obtained by the branch and
bound algorithm. Then S3 is contracted to be a new DG
node G3 , whose output power is 0.5 kW.
4. Tree T4 rooted at the current maximum power source DG6
is formed. Island S4 composed of DG6 and load nodes 62 –68
is obtained by the branch and bound algorithm. S4 is
contracted to be a new DG node G4 , whose output power is
5.58 kW.
5. Tree T5 rooted at the current maximum power source DG5 is
formed. Island S5 including DG5 and load nodes 29–33 is
obtained by the branch and bound algorithm. S5 is contracted
to be a new DG node G5 , whose output power is 0.5 kW.
Above island isolating procedures are illustrated in Fig. 3.
6. As the surplus powers of isolated islands S1– S5 are,
respectively, less than the loads directly connecting to them,
the island isolating procedure is over.
7. In Fig. 3, as there is no load directly connecting to
multiple DGs, there is no need for the procedure of island
combination. By the load priority, the 24-kW surplus
power of island S1, 16.5 kW surplus power of island S2
and 5.58 kW surplus power of island S4 are supplied to
load at node 53 node 21, respectively, and at node 69.
Thus, the initial island partition scheme is gained and is
presented in Fig. 4. At Fig. 4, loads at nodes 21, 53 and
69 are only partially restored, the controllable load at node
43 is shed completely, and loads at other nodes are
completely restored.
8. In each isolated island S1– S5, let the DG with maximum
output be the slack node and other DGs be PV node, power
flow calculation is performed for each island to check
whether there exists any of constraint violations. The
calculation results indicate that there is no node voltage
violation in the five islands; because of the network losses
of island S1 – S5, which are 3.67, 2.079, 0.38, 0.0258 and
0.23 kW, respectively, some DGs’ power outputs in islands
S1, S2 and S4 are beyond their limits, respectively, but the
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power output for each DG in islands S3 and S5 is within its
limit, respectively; in island S2, the power flow through
branches 18 – 19 is beyond its limit.
Some loads in island S1 , S2 and S4 have to be shed to ensure
each DG’s output in island S1 , S2 and S4 and the power flow
through branches 18– 19 all within its limit. By the load
shedding rule listed above, 4-kW load at node 53, 2.1 kW
load at node 13, 21 kW load at node 58 and the 0.03 kW
load at node 69 are shed to make each DG’s output in
islands S1 , S2 and S4 and the power flow through lines 18–
19 all within its limit, respectively.
By this time, the optimal island partition scheme is
obtained. The restored loads at the nodes 69, 53, 58 and 13
are changed from 5.58, 24, 28 and 8 kW in initial island
partition scheme to 5.55, 20, 7 and 5.9, respectively. The
priority one loads at nodes 6, 9, 12, 18, 35, 37, 42, 51, 57
and 62 are completely restored, and the total restored load
is 2111.82 kW. It should be noted that the above load
shedding are just guided by the simple sensitivity method,
and a better way for it is to adopt the OPF method, which
is not included in this study.
For comparison, the island partition methods proposed by
Yuping et al. [10] and Yiming and Miu Karen [6] are
implemented for the same system and the results are
presented in Figs. 5a and b, respectively.
Results of the power flow calculation show that there is no
constraint violation in Fig. 5a. The total restored load by the
method of [10] is 1076.89 kW, which is much less than
2111.82 kW restored by the method of this paper. The
reason for the difference is owing to the fact that 1244 kW
uncontrollable load at node 53, cannot be restored by DG4
if the isolated island including nodes DG4, 51, 52, 53 and
54 is formed by the method of [10]. In addition, all the
priority one loads are completely restored in the scheme
proposed in this paper, whereas only part of them
including loads at nodes 6, 9, 18, 37, 42, 51 are restored
in the island partition scheme shown at Fig. 5a. The
priority one loads at nodes 12, 35, 57, 62 could not be
restored.
The island partition scheme shown in Fig. 5b is formed by
the graph-based algorithm proposed in [6]. In this scheme, all
the controllable loads at nodes 11, 13, 28, 34, 43, 44, 48 are
shed to meet the requirement of power balance. To avoid the
IET Gener. Transm. Distrib., 2012, Vol. 6, Iss. 3, pp. 218 –225
doi: 10.1049/iet-gtd.2010.0812

power flow constraint violation of branches 18– 19, load at
node 16 is shed as well.
The total restored load is 2070.55 kW, which is less than
2111.82 kW that is restored by the scheme proposed in this
paper. This is caused by the facts that only one island is
constructed with the method proposed in [6], whereas DGs
in the interested area are far away from each other, which
leads to high network loss in the resulted island scheme. It
is 9.58 kW comparing to the 5.36 kW network loss that is
resulted in this research.
6 Conclusions
In this paper, a new optimal island partition model for the
distribution system with multiple DGs is presented, and an
effective two-stage algorithm is designed to solve the
model. The advantages of the model and algorithm
proposed could be summarised as follows:
1. Taking into account all the key factors for the optimal
island scheme including the security constraints of power
balance, voltage and equipment transmission capability;
maximum load restoration; load priorities and
controllability, the proposed method meets the practical
engineering application requirement.
2. Owing to the complexity of the problem, a decomposition
strategy is adopted to divide the problem into two sequential
sub-problems, which are solved in two stages by the branch
and bound algorithm for TKP, and feasibility checking and
reasonably adjusting, respectively. The branch and bound
algorithm for TKP is further improved by three proposed
measures, which enables the approximate optimal scheme
to be found within the acceptable time.
With the increasing penetration of DGs, island operation
will become an important operation mode of the future
distribution system. The proposed optimal island partition
method owns the great potential to be applied in practical
engineering planning and operations.
7 Acknowledgment
This study was supported by the National Science Foundation
of China (51177107).
IET Gener. Transm. Distrib., 2012, Vol. 6, Iss. 3, pp. 218– 225
doi: 10.1049/iet-gtd.2010.0812
www.ietdl.org
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